Adult incontinence (“AI”) articles are designed to absorb and contain liquid and other discharges from the human body to prevent the body and clothing from becoming soiled. One challenge is to provide a line-up of AI articles that meets the urine containment needs while providing an article that meets the fit and comfort desires of diverse wearers, which can range over several hundred pounds. These challenges include bulkiness and stiffness of the absorbent core, in both the dry and wet state.
In recent years, absorbent core designs have progressed toward structures with relatively higher proportions by weight of absorbent polymer particles and lower proportions of absorbent fiber (e.g., cellulose fiber), resulting in structures that are thinner than absorbent core designs of earlier years and enabling manufacture of products that are less bulky when dry. The latter structures, however, can be slower in liquid acquisition rate, and because of their greater proportions of absorbent polymer particles, can become saggy, bulky and gelatinous when wetted. To address these issues, absorbent structures including longitudinally-oriented channels have been developed (hereafter referred to as channels).
Appropriately located and structured longitudinal channels can help distribute liquid along deposits of absorbent polymer particles along the length of the absorbent core, and thereby help improve acquisition rate. They also can help reduce chances of a saggy and bulky appearance of the article when wetted by providing longitudinal structural rigidity through the crotch region of the article resulting from pressure within the wetted absorbent polymer particle deposits between the channels. They also help by providing natural hinge zones, which can minimize the appearance of bulk while improving overall comfort to the wearer.
Examples of channels suitable for use with articles of the present disclosure are disclosed in WO2012/170778 (Rosati et al., see also WO2012/170779, WO2012/170781 and WO2012/170808), further in WO2014/093319, WO2014/093311 (both Arizti) and WO2014/093310 (Ehrnsperger). The material free zone in these disclosures may be curved. Other prior art discloses channels that are straight, and typically oriented in the longitudinal and/or transverse direction of the core, as in WO95/11652 (Tanzer) or WO2012/052,172A1 (Van Malderen).
There is a need to improve fit and comfort of absorbent articles. Providing absorbent articles of different dimensions (in longitudinal and transversal direction) based on the body dimensions to provide the right coverage and performance is known. The present inventors have now found that the channel dimensions and shape as well as position of the channels within an array of articles should be specifically adapted to the size of the wearer. Adapting the dimensions of the channels to BMI driven morphological changes (leg and crotch shape) is beneficial to enable proper fit and comfort along the full range of consumers. In addition, the inventors have found a correlation between channel dimensions, shape and position and BMI driven morphological changes (i.e., like leg and crotch shape) that can be used to improve fit and comfort for a given sizes of articles in an array. In short, the geometry of the channels should be adapted to the BMI of the wearer to provide for better fit and comfort.
Body Mass Index (BMI) is on the rise globally for both men and women. In the U.S. alone, more than ⅓ of adult females are now considered obese (BMI>30). This has changed significantly over the past 30 years; in 1980 only about 16% of U.S. adult females were obese. Larger women exhibit different ratios of body anthropometrics than smaller women, i.e., all body dimensions do not simply scale-up as women get larger. In addition, women across the range of BMI may also have very different body shapes. There is a lack of recognition and understanding of this issue by current adult absorbent article manufacturers and as such consumers' needs are not being adequately met. Therefore, there is a need to develop adult absorbent articles for a wide variety of body shapes and sizes in order to provide an improved level of fit and contact between the body and the adult absorbent article to reduce the occurrence of leakage and improve the overall fit, comfort, coverage and discretion of the article. There is a clear need for adult absorbent articles which are designed for variety of wearers based on their BMI and body shape. There is also a need to communicate to wearers the benefits of such customized adult absorbent articles in an easy-to-understand manner (e.g., some women may not understand what BMI is or know their BMI number), which is not off-putting (e.g., without stigmatizing or embarrassing women based on their BMI).
Thus, it is an object of the present disclosure to describe absorbent articles and arrays of absorbent articles whereby the channels are integrated into the absorbent articles and are designed to meet the consumer needs across the BMI range wherein each size in the array is intended to fit, both when the pant is dry and after it is wetted.